Member-only story
Will Simily Rise Again?
14 weeks on a platform that needs new life
I’ve now been chronicling my journey on the fiction writing platform Simily for 14 weeks.
Here’s the bottom line: Simily now has just over 3400 members and there’s essentially no growth. The number of people joining seems to roughly match the number of people leaving.
I now have 107 followers — adding maybe 1 a week at this point.
Here’s one of my recent stories posted there:
I suppose there are advantages to being an early participant on a platform. You can see all the changes and you can quite possibly welcome each new member for a while. Perhaps being on early allows you to build a loyal following.
That said, at some point, it grows frustrating. I have repeatedly noted that the founders are conducting group Zoom sessions to ask about ways to improve. I’ve heard from other writers that there are plans to migrate to a new platform.
The question: How soon?
Those of us on Simily now — the early adopters — are ready for change. While the adjustments (the ability to block users, for example) have been nice, a new platform/interface really is needed. Simply put, Simily cannot survive as a slow loading WordPress site.
My suspicion is the founders are looking for funding in order to make a migration possible. The membership fees likely won’t pay for this. So, they need an influx of cash from an investor.
Simily can work — it can be a fiction-focused version of Medium. However, until the platform can be migrated, it seems it would be a good investment to advertise or use social media or both in order to build some additional excitement. This would appeal to writers and also, likely, to investors. If you’re going to invest in a writing platform, you want to see some energy around it.
I will also note that one of my Simily stories that I’ve also published here continues to be a top earner for me here on Medium.
What’s your Simily story? What platforms have you found for publishing fiction?
